To send a sick toddler to nursery?

[user4321]

Im on my way to work feeling awful having just dropped my 18month old off at nursery. He is unwell in the sense he has a cold and runny nose and temp, is being more clingy and is more sensitive to tantrums than his usual self. It is more likely than not that the nursery will call one of us to collect him, but my DH has a meeting first thing (after that he is free and can leave work if required). With my employer, it looks better if I’m called away than to not show up in the first place. But I’m feeling guilty and thinking I shouldn’t have left him there in the first place, is it unfair on the staff?

There's no right answer is there? She's old company (v large client services firm) used to provide 10 days of emergency childcare to avoid them having to take days off due to child sickness. A good solution in some ways but not in others.

Genuine question - parents with children with immune system problems, how do you cope with soft play, school etc where you can't police if children come in sick, do you just have to avoid them altogether?

Whilst I understand the pressure to not take time off work when your child is ill, it really is important to think about other people's children too. My DD has type 1 diabetes: what could be a simple sickness bug or virus for your child becomes something far worse for mine. It would result in close monitoring, maybe a hospital stay or even worse. It is really important to follow 'sick day rules' and not send with a fever and keep off 48 hours after a bout of sickness.

I wish people realised that by the time children (and indeed adults) are exhibiting signs of illness, it's usually past the incubation period, in which case there would have been no/not very many signs! The incubation period is the time in which most bugs are passed on, so most people don't even realise they've been infected. So it's not as simple as 'keeping them off' to prevent illness because 8/10 you don't even know they are ill until they're already in the throes of a virus, by which point everyone may be infected. That's how it works.

Anyway - OP - I am a full time working mum. I have a 14 month old who has been permanently teething since May. Sometimes his temp hits 37.5 before nursery, with absolutely no ill effects. I always tell them and say he is running hotter than usual and they always monitor it - it usually goes down and never goes back up again. I don't give calpol unless it hits 38 or he's showing signs of being unwell. He had HFAM which made his temperature go up to 38.5 but he was showing signs of being unwell. Quite simply, if I kept him off for every temperature reading above 37 I would go to work 2/3 days a week. I check in twice a day to see how he is and I've pulled him out of nursery with a temp of 37.5 because he wasn't eating and wasn't napping - even though he wasn't showing signs of having anything other than a mild fever, whatever it was was clearly bothering him. turned out it was a tooth and all was well.

I don't think you were being unreasonable, but I would have hesitated with a temperature of 38, unless it was isolated to one ear and clearly teething, because babies do get mild temperatures. It's not contagious and in my experience my son has always felt and behaved better at nursery with teething than he has at home.

Sometimes it feels damned if you do, damned if you don't.

I’m sorry to hear your story rainbow, are your saying that every single person (adult, child or toddler) with mild cold symptoms (which often comes with a low temp) should stay in quarantine and not go to nursery, school or work?

The child had a slight temp under 38, and the sniffles.
In RL people send kids to school/nursery/work with colds etc.
I understand the anger if it were raging infection, chickenpox, or d&v, but we are talking about the sniffles

To those of you calling OP selfish - do you stay indoors all winter? Never go to the supermarket? The park? God forbid do you sit in the GP surgery? (the best place to actually catch something!).
Do you take you little ones to the library, playgroups?
Interested to see how you would cope if you saw a child in any of those places with - gasp - a runny nose!

www.gov.uk/time-off-for-dependants

Forgive the lack of proper link, its been a long time since I used html. Though I am a SAHM my husband works and I have to ram this down his workplace's throats quite frequently.

Many people have said before YABU so I won't berate you further however, as a pregnant mum that miscarried earlier this year - possibly due to slapped cheek - I would definitely say please keep your child at home with a temperature. Its not fair to everyone involved, I have a very sickly family and in some cases even a cold could be fatal to some of us.

Boston- trust me, they will take their kids to the GP/hospital. They will be the ones demanding antibiotics and happily infecting all the (potentially very ill) patients in the surgery.

I and my 4 year old do definitely avoid children with runny noses, soft play, other public places for most of Nov- Feb. Exceptions are Nursery and birthday parties but I keep him home if even a whiff of the sniffles or if I hear some of the other kids are coming down with illnesses. Perks of being a SAHM! Prevention of spreading of disease.

@Drinaballerina

I have a baby under 2 yrs old with a compromised immune system who takes long-term antibiotics.
No nursery or playgroup.
We do not go into the supermarket to do a big shop - though I would run in with the buggy to pick up a couple of items.
I don't allow other people to touch baby - including other children - so we keep the raincover on outside school.
Baby doesn't get out of the buggy and play on the hospital/GP surgery floor. If someone is really poorly in the waiting room, I'm happy to go outside in the fresh air....
Baby doesn't play with toys from the hospital/GP waiting room.
All our family/friends know if they have been ill they are not to visit - 36 hours is what we ask.
We do however have older children who bring home germs - constantly - so far baby doesn't tend to catch much (crosses fingers!), I allow babe to play on our kitchen floor, with the cat, in our garden etc....lead a normal life, but if older kids are sick we keep them apart, clean thoroughly, wash separate towels etc...

Kids are snotty....colds and low grade temps, we come across them every day and are normal.....lets not beat up OP about them, we are all mums doing our best

I think if there’s a temp - stay at home. Just use your judgement - colds often don’t have temps but nasty viruses and infections do

Re what do parents with kids with low immune systems do - the answer is live in fear of germs! We avoid the worst offenders (busy soft plays, very packed in classes), all our friends know to pre warn us if their kids are ill and we are due to meet so we can judge if we want to still meet or not, teach your child immatulate handwashing, and then just hope for the best. You and your child have to live, but honestly when I turn up at a class and there’s 4 kids there (we pick quiet ones) but one kid is covered in not yet properly crusted over chicken pox my blood does boil!!

@bostonkremekrazy thanks for the very detailed explanation- that must be incredibly tough and definitely will make me think more about my decisions. Luckily I'm self employed so can just take the day off if DD2 is sick - DD1 never got sick!

I have to say OP, that if I were you and originally started out feeling guilty, reading this thread would have made me feel less so. After the absolute lack of any understanding of your position and the horrible name-calling you have endured, I wouldn't actually give a flying fuck if some people or their offspring did catch something from your child.

So sorry for you OP for the amount of nasty comments you got here. You were in an impossible situation and I would've done the same thing if I were you.
Our DCs get germs from nursery all the time. I even got chickenpox from my DC1 who got it from nursery. DC1 was fine but I couldn't move with 40 C fever for three days. Annoying but germs are not something you can control 100%. Of course it's sensible not to send children with spots all over to nursery, but there is a long incubation period. It's silly for people to be pointing fingers about who got what germ. For all you know it could be those who complains about other children's germs to be the original source, but it's not possible to know either way.
Those with immune issues, sympathies for you, but the most sensible thing is for the vulnerable ones to take preventative measures, stay away from high risk places (like maybe don't go to a big nursery and choose a small childminder). But to police everyone else what to do, that's just taking the piss.

YABU How would you feel if someone deliberately and for a few hours convenience came in with the same symptoms as your DC. Spreading goodness knows what to all and sundry never mind the poor wee soul being left until convenient for you. If you can't care properly either don't work or don't have kids. Simple.

Don’t think you are being unreasonable. If ur child was obviously poorly you wouldn’t have had a choice. Kids bounce back very quickly from things too. It is also true that we build immunity through exposure to colds and sniffles so not entirely in agreement that isolation is the way forward. The only published reason for keeping kids away from school and nursery is sickness and diarrhoea.

What a load of self righteous, dramatic, unkind people you are.

Don't even sweat it OP, you did the right thing.

Don't feel bad. These things happen and sometimes you can't make the decision you might prefer to, or you make a decision you regret. And sometimes you just learn from experience. We are all human. But obviously all the perfect parents have come out of the woodwork to criticise you, as often happens on here.
Ignore them and in future just go with your gut feeling.

mustbemad 17 Thu 23-Nov-17 12:24:37
Having the chicken pox vaccination doesn't stop your child catching - and passing on - chicken pox

Not true.
The Varivax and Varilrix vaccines are weakened/attenuated. They are generally not capable of causing the disease but will still stimulate the immune system enough to cause immunity. About 2% of vaccinated children in the US (where the vax is required before school entry in most states) go down with a very mild case of the pox.

mustbemad17 Thu 23-Nov-17 13:38:19
Katie when we questioned the CP vax we were advised it is like every other vax; it reduces risk but doesn't prevent it. My GPs are such liars then.

Let's say they are not very good at communicating the facts? Reducing the risk so significantly that only 2% will catch a very mild case is really excellent.

In an ideal world, anyone with a hint of the sniffles would instantly take sick leave, in an office based job. But they can't ring in sick with 'a hint of a cold' and so they soldier on, until they really can't continue. By which time every other fucker has caught it and it's a domino effect in the new 'Open office'. Marvellous, well done industry! Bet you saved loads of worker hours. Or not.
Bad worker culture begets what it deserves.

It's incredible that events such as meetings still require people to be bodily present. We have technology that even my 84 year old mum knows how to use to talk to her grandchildren on another continent.

I agree with CaptainBrickbeard Fri 24-Nov-17 20:28:52
This thread is awful. Mums flinging blame at one another, calling each other selfish, neglectful, uncaring etc and ignoring the real problem. A lot of women are pushed into difficult situations where they can't win and whatever they choose, this thread proves they'll be pilloried for it.

What is actually the problem is that our society is totally unsupportive of working parents. We need better employee rights and protections. We should be levelling our criticism at a callous government with a cruel and heartless approach to welfare. We need to challenge perceptions and insist on decent support.

It's really telling that the OP's DH (probably) didn't spend any time agonising over the decision to send DS to nursery. Apologies to him if he logged onto whatever dad's parenting site he has joined to discuss the ethics of what was decided this morning.

The tough cheese women and children (and low-paid nursery workers) are dealing with won't change until men decide to campaign for family sick leave, and start taking up whatever their employers offer.

My child has a compromised immune system. This kind of stuff really pisses me off.
Your job doesn't trump someone else's life.

I agree OP was in a tough situation... & if you’ve had lots of time off work already it is hard. But a temp for me would’ve made the decision.

I did find out at DD’s Nursery (years later) from another parent that there was a kid whose parents were both doctors & if he vomited or had d&v they gave him suppositories to stop it & still went to Nursery! I was horrified - and angry! At 18 months my DD was in hospital 3 days with a vomiting bug & lost so much weight! Prob thanks to them!

Mums have enough guilt without us flaming the OP however.... she clearly feels guilty enough.

@geekinheels
Those with immune issues, sympathies for you, but the most sensible thing is for the vulnerable ones to take preventative measures, stay away from high risk places (like maybe don't go to a big nursery and choose a small childminder). But to police everyone else what to do, that's just taking the piss.

Wow really?! So because my DD has a disability (type 1 diabetes is covered by DDA) she shouldn't go to a normal large nursery so other parents can send their children in with contagious illnesses?! Don't agree with having social responsibility then? Send all the immuno-compromised children elsewhere so they don't inconvenience your job?! It's not policing other people - its common bloody sense not to send your children to nursery/school if they have a fever! (I'm not talking about just a cough/cold - I know they're unavoidable).

It’s not just those with low immune systems - it’s pregnant mums and their newborns -going to keep those away from every nursery?! And their elderly grandparents etc etc.

As someone else said you’d job or inconvenience doesn’t trump someone else’s life